Home in Tasmania again

Spring daffodils in September

I dropped the ball on this blog for a while and, in picking it up again have found it to be bigger and much more noticeable, like a bright, shiny new basketball that bounces enthusiastically with resilience and zest. 

After a northern hemisphere summer spent at my Whidbey island home, (one of the most beautiful summers Washington state has ever seen) I have arrived back to a green, lush Tasmania that is buzzing with anticipation of a tourist season that promises to be one of the best ever. 

Log cabins in the bush

The secret is out; the one we have been telling people about in the USA for the past 20 years.  The Tourist Information Centre in Hobart (www.hobarttravelcentre.com.au) where I work part-time, is already bustling with activity, both in person and via email and phone calls.

Mainlander Aussies (and people from all over the world) have found out that Tasmania is the place to visit, especially in the summer.  While they are burning up in the scorching desert heat west of the great dividing range, or sweltering through a tropical summer in northern Queensland, Tasmanians will be experiencing one of our uniquely refreshing summers  – mild, sunny and dry for the most part, with every other possible combination of weather added in, but rarely the sweltering heat of mainland Australia. 

Bush daffodils

As I tell people in the USA who comment on the fact that I never spend a winter anywhere, with my seasonal rotation through spring, summer and autumn in Tassie, then summer in the USA, I get plenty of winter experiences in Tasmania in the time I’m here (snow on Mt. Wellington right behind my house a few days ago is a case in point!)

It’s lovely to be home, with the fresh smell of eucalyptus forest in my back yard, the wallabies hopping away from the lights of my car when I arrive home after dark, and kookaburras laughing raucously at the sight of me hanging out the washing, as if they get the joke -  that just because the sun is shining at this moment, it’ll probably be pissing with rain 10 minutes from now!

I took a friend out to our bush property about an hour from Hobart yesterday and the sun stayed with us most of the day, along with a gentle wind and occasional clouds blowing through.  The daffodils were still out, an incongruous sight in a bushland that feels like it’s hundreds of miles from anywhere, and I was reminded again of why I love this place so much – it is the silence.  Apart from the wind and the occasional call of native birds, the overwhelming feeling is one of peace and stillness – an undeniable call to pay attention to the natural world that is so often forgotten when one’s head is buried in a mobile device that suddenly seems terribly important, even though I just lived without one for 4 months and my world didn’t end. 

I will always remember waking up one morning in the "big cabin", and as I drifted up to consciousness I was vaguely aware of an unfamiliar sound.  As I became more alert I realized what it was – in the morning stillness I could actually hear the sound of my own heartbeat. 

Now I’m back in my office with the view of the city and harbor in the distance that will soon be bustling with waterfront festivals and the arrival of a record number of cruise ships.  The ferocious winds blowing down from Mt Wellington and the sulphur-crested cockatoos in the morning are a more noisy reminder of Nature’s presence in this wild and wonderful island place.

It’s good to be home.

Cheers,

Rosie